Dr Paul Allen

In 841 BC, the prophet Elisha’s messenger came to Jehu’s house and anointed him the next king of Israel. According to the Lord’s purpose, Jehu was to destroy the house of Ahab so that God might avenge the blood of His prophets. Jehu executed this divine mandate with unprecedented zeal. His zeal to destroy those the Lord commanded be destroyed, including all the prophets of Baal, was astonishing. Unfortunately, Jehu was not zealous against all idolatry (2 Kings 10:29). For almost a century, two abominable golden calves had stood in the land to ensure the Israelites did not travel south to worship in the temple and re-unify the kingdom. Rather than completing his eradication of idolatry, Jehu left these two graven images primarily to protect his own political interests. This lesson from Jehu warns that we can be zealous against idolatry and even purge idols from our lives while still protecting our most cherished ones. As we close this series, we consider how Christians can be zealous ag...

And Jehu wrote and sent letters to Samaria, to the rulers of Jezreel, to the elders, ... Now the king's sons, seventy persons, were with the great men of the city, who .... Then Jehu sent throughout all Israel; and all the worshipers of Baal came, so that ... To say he made it a refuse dump is literally that he made it a public toilet. 2 Kings 9:6-8 Israeli archaeologists have discovered a stone toilet while excavating a Jewish shrine at an ancient city gate, evidence that a biblical king tried to stamp out Baal worship there. King Hezekiah deliberately defiled the eighth century BC shrine at the door to the ancient city of Lachish, as part of a campaign to centralise Jewish faith in Jerusalem, the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) said. "A toilet was installed in the Baal temple as the ultimate desecration of that place," the IAA said in a statement. "A stone fashioned in the shape of a chair with a hole in its centre was found in the corner of the room." ...